Former Assemblyman Richard Katz and City Councilwoman Laura Chick called Thursday for an audit of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority to determine if the agency has given the San Fernando Valley its share of rail funding. In particular, the two Valley lawmakers want to make sure that the MTA has complied with a 1984 law that requires spending 15% of all local rail money in the Valley or setting it aside in a trust fund.

The Metropolitan Transportation Authority may have trouble with its tunnels, but there's now no doubt about the holes in its finances. An independent analysis of the MTA's $2.8-billion budget by Mayor Richard Riordan's staff has found "unrealistic financial assumptions and flawed funding plans," including a bigger deficit in this year's budget than the agency thought existed--one that could grow to nearly $60 million.

The Metropolitan Transportation Authority may have trouble with its tunnels, but there's now no doubt about the holes in its finances. An independent analysis of the MTA's $2.8-billion budget by Mayor Richard Riordan's staff has found "unrealistic financial assumptions and flawed funding plans," including a bigger deficit in this year's budget than the agency thought existed--one that could grow to nearly $60 million.

The top manager of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority's Pasadena Blue Line project was replaced and his deputy was fired Friday in the wake of a scathing audit that found skyrocketing design and engineering costs. Project manager David Sievers was reassigned to another job, deputy project manager Lynn Struthers was terminated and a new interim project manager was appointed in a major shake-up of those in charge of running the $800-million light-rail project.

Whether you live in Long Beach or Palmdale, you should care about the Los Angeles subway project. You're paying for it. Every time you buy anything taxable in Los Angeles County, one cent of every dollar goes to the Metropolitan Transportation Authority.

On the heels of another blistering audit of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority's light rail line to Pasadena, the agency has disciplined the project's top two officials for failing to curb chronic cost overruns that have sent design costs skyrocketing to almost $94 million with construction barely begun.

A state audit released Wednesday concludes that Los Angeles County's long-range plan for delivering a new array of bus and rail lines appears "flawed" and that it may be necessary for transit officials to again scale back their vision of how to relieve gridlock in the 21st century. The report concluded that the Metropolitan Transportation Authority's $72-billion, 20-year blueprint may contain a $1.

Expanding a year-old program to install guardrails along city streets where dangerous driving conditions exist, the Los Angeles City Council has allocated $200,000 for new rails to be added in the next nine months. Last year, $50,000 was allocated for the program, with supplemental funds from the city's Department of Transportation. To date, 7,400 feet of metal beam guardrails have been installed throughout the city. Funding is provided by the state's gas tax.

In a dramatic bid to help yank Orange County out of bankruptcy and help Los Angeles County avoid a similar fate, state lawmakers agreed early Sunday to let the financially strapped counties siphon tax dollars that would normally go to finance mass transit. The late-night legislation calls for Los Angeles County to shift $75 million a year in transit funds for five years and for Orange County to tap $70 million annually for 15 years.

Orange County road projects will be endangered and bus service virtually halted--forcing layoffs of hundreds of transit workers--under the Legislature's midnight deal to let the bankrupt county raid $1 billion in transportation agency funds, county officials said Sunday. "This is just a disaster for Orange County," said Charles V. Smith, the chairman of the Orange County Transportation Authority.